links for 2009-11-11

The Internet Archive and founding companies announce today the launch of 301Works.org, a service to archive shortened Universal Resource Locators (URLs). This will enable redirect services to incorporate these shortened URLs when a member company ceases business activities.

The use of shortened URLs has grown dramatically due to the popularity of Twitter and similar micro-streaming services where posts are limited to a small number of characters. Millions of shortened URLs are generated for users every day by a wide variety of companies.

Another word about heart and leadership: A lot of big companies tell new employees to bring their brains and their effort to work but leave their emotional baggage at home. In essence, they tell them to cut their hearts out and leave them on the doorstep to be reclaimed when they get home. "We have enough problems of our own; we don't need your personal problems here" is an example of a style where the "managing" function dominates.

In researching his new book, Googled: the End of the World as We Know It, to be published next week by Penguin Press, author Ken Auletta had extensive access to the company's inner workings and reported widely on its impact on the media landscape.

In a Fortune.com exclusive, he offers ten enduring lessons drawn from his journey into Google's realm:

1.) Passion wins

Start with the words of advice — "Don't settle" — that Larry Page offered the Stanford graduating class in 2002. This intensity was revealed in the zeal with which he and Sergey Brin inspired the entire company to "serve the user," to take more risks, to radically improve search.

Or as CEO Eric Schmidt told me: while he assumed that "Google would be an important company; the founders always assumed that Google would be a defining company."

It goes without saying that many of us spend a considerable amount of our day on the web. We send toots, write blog posts, upload images to Flickr, all that stuff. For our peers, consuming this content is relatively easy because most of them are either already watching it happen or have the know-how to be notified when new crap shows up via RSS or whatever. But, what about your Mom?

Ethan Zuckerman writes "There are many things I admire about my friend and colleague, David Weinberger: his intellectual curiosity, his generosity with his time and guidance, his sense of humor… One facet of David I most admire is his willingness to think in public. Most people who speak for a living (as David does, and as I aspire to do) use well-worn and carefully roadtested material. David is brave enough to put new ideas in front of audiences and work through new ideas, live and in public. And we’re lucky enough at the Berkman Center lunch today to hear his new talk, “What Information Was: Bits, Links and the Iron Rule of Irony”, an exploration of issues that David is starting to think about and wrestle with."

One of the things that many bloggers shy away from is giving their users an ability to contact the author. The reason why contact pages are important is because users can be very helpful in terms of getting feedback, new ideas, and suggestions. Also contact forms provide a way for your potential advertisers and clients to reach you therefore everyone should have a contact form or page. In this article we will be showcasing the collection of some of the best contact forms and pages implemented within WordPress as well as showing you how you can create your own contact form in WordPress.

In a way, your online audience is like a Botox user. Even if you have an enthusiastic audience for your blog, your Facebook page, or your Twitter feed, the enthusiasm is invisible. The audience is mostly non-responsive and hard to read. In the absence of feedback, it's easy to make the same mistake I made in my conversation: I panicked. I strayed from my message (rambling), looking for something, anything that would spark a reaction.

Personas is an art installation by Aaron Zinman that is a component of Metropath(ologies), an interactive exhibit by the Sociable Media Group, MIT Media Lab. Metropath(ologies) is by Alex Dragulescu, Yannick Assogba, Aaron Zinman under the direction of Prof. Judith Donath.